Join the ANU Indonesia Project and the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership for a special seminar marking the United Nations International Day of Care and Support on 29 October.
Who Minds the Children? Childcare Use and Women’s Employment in Indonesia and Southeast Asia
Childcare sits at the heart of gender equality, women's economic participation and inclusive growth across Southeast Asia. Yet the policy debate still tends to reduce childcare to a question of price and places. This seminar brings together two papers that look further: at how care is organised inside households and across informal networks, and at how different kinds of early childhood services shape whether mothers can work.
Event Details
- Date: Thursday 29 October 2026
- Time: 9:00 AM – 10:30 AM WIB / 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM AEDT
- Format: Online webinar http://bit.ly/gs_indonesia
Event Speakers
Dr Hang Anh (Tia) Nguyen (Global Institute for Women’s Leadership) will present Beyond Affordability: Care Economy Insights on Childcare and Implications for Foreign Policy and Aid in Southeast Asia. Drawing on the Social Norms, Attitudes and Practices Survey (SNAPS), the paper examines how childcare responsibilities and preferences for paid care vary across households and countries, taking account of socio-demographic characteristics, household conditions and social norms. It draws out what these patterns mean for how governments, development partners and private providers invest in childcare and the wider care economy.
Lolita Moorena (J-PAL Southeast Asia) will present The Impact of Daycare, Playgroup and Kindergarten on Maternal Employment, published in the Bulletin of Indonesian Economics Studies (BIES). Using new data on early childhood service providers from the Indonesian government's education institutions registry, the study asks how access to each type of service affects mothers' work. Daycare matters most for mothers of infants; kindergarten is the main driver for mothers of 4-6 year olds; and many working mothers combine the two, using kindergarten in the morning and daycare for the rest of the day. Playgroup, with its short hours, does little on its own for mothers' employment. The findings show that longer-duration childcare services are an important factor in driving maternal employment.
Nurina Merdikawati (ANU Indonesia Project) will chair this seminar.
Image: World Bank
Event Speakers
Lolita Morena
Lolita Moorena is a Postdoctoral Fellow at J-PAL Southeast Asia and a PhD student in economics at the Australian National University. She specializes in development economics, with a focus on gender, labor markets, and digital finance inclusion.
Hang Anh (Tia) Nguyen
Dr Hang Anh (Tia) Nguyen is a Research Fellow at the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at the Australian National University. Her research explores how social norms, institutional frameworks and structural barriers shape economic inequalities across gender and intersecting social dimensions, with a focus on developing contexts.
Global Institute for Women's Leadership
Global Institute for Women’s Leadership (GIWL) at ANU brings together research, practice and advocacy to advance gender equality and women’s leadership. This event is co-hosted by the ANU Indonesia Project and GIWL.